While perusing the cluttered aisles of the Forest Park Army Navy Store in search of land mines and face paint, something behind the gun counter caught my eye. I’m usually a skeet/trap/hunting gun guy. But on this day, two racks of long heavy guns, each with a rich patina and a sign that read, “Mosin-Nagant M91/30 with bayonet and accessory pack $119.99,” broke my attention away from the bazooka sitting on a shelf above the counter.
“Those will make great Christmas gifts,” I blurted out loud. Ten years had passed since a gun not in the hands of an Oxycontin addict, thief, or a down-on-his-luck family member was offered to me at such a great price. After the other customers inched slowly away from me, I inquired about the rifles.
The shopkeep explained that the rifles are World War II-era Russian service weapons used to kill Nazis and…
I interrupted, “Stop. That’s all I needed to hear. Sold!”
Further research revealed the Russians phased the Mosin out of service after the war but refurbished, stockpiled, and stored the guns during the Cold War as reserves in case shit hit the fan. And hit the fan it did — economically speaking last year. During the past year, the Russian scramble for cash coincided with the American gun rush and once bitter enemies found peace and joy through firearms and money.
For me, it wasn’t long before Christmas rolled around and Grandma sent her annual I-don’t-know-what-to-get-you present, in the form of a check and I bolted to Forest Park to pick out my piece of history. It’s an ex-dragoon model with a hex-receiver built in 1929 at the Izhevsk plant. The dings, scuffs, stamps, and imperfections found throughout the gun’s 80-year-old body provide hours of entertainment in the form of conjuring up speculation, theories, and scenarios about its life.
Now I’ve convinced my cohorts to acquire surplus Mosins thus creating our own limited-membership gun club. Because surplus ammunition for the Mosin is plentiful too, our club can purchase cheap “spam-cans” containing 440 rounds of well-preserved Iron Curtain ammo. Spam-cans are literally steel cans that resemble a giant can of sardines or Spam and require a can-opener to open. I expect our gun-club membership to grow quickly over the next few weeks. But for now, I’ll continue to practice my bayoneting motions in the mirror and kill imaginary Nazis in my spare time.
